CHAPTER XXI.
CYRUS THE YOUNGER.

“Listen then to what happened. Cyrus, to put a long story in a few words, collected by one means or another about thirteen thousand Greek soldiers. He gave out that he was going to lead them against the mountain tribes of Cilicia. But his real object has all along been to march up to Susa, and drive the King from his throne. Clearchus knew this; I fancy some others guessed it; I know I did for one. But the army knew nothing about it. Of course it had to come out at last. When we came to Tarsus, the men had to be told. If we were going to act against the Cicilian mountaineers, now was the time. If not, why had we been brought so far? When the truth was known there was a frightful uproar. The men declared that they would go back. It was madness, they said, for a few thousand men to march against the Great King. For four days I thought all was lost. Clearchus and Cyrus managed admirably. I will tell you all about it some day. Meanwhile it is enough to say that all is settled. The men have changed their tone completely. They talk of nothing but ransacking the treasuries of the King, and Cyrus is quite magnificent in his promises. He gives a great banquet to the officers to-night. I am going with Proxenus, who is my special friend among the generals, and I have no doubt that I can take you. Cyrus, I assure you, is a man worth knowing, and, though we should call him a barbarian, worth serving.”

The Persian prince, when Callias came to make his acquaintance, bore out, and more than bore out, the high character which Xenophon had given of him. A more princely man in look and bearing never lived. That he was a stern ruler was well known, but his subjects needed stern methods; but for courtesy and generosity he could not be matched, and he had that genial manner which makes these qualities current coin in the market of the world. He was of unusual stature, his frame well knit and well proportioned, and his face, though slightly disfigured by scars which he had received in early life in a fierce death struggle with a bear, singularly handsome. Proxenus introduced his friend’s friend as a young Athenian who had come to put his sword at his disposal, and Cyrus at once greeted him with that manner of friendliness and even comradeship which made him so popular. At the same time he made some complimentary remark about Athens, saying that the Athenians had been formidable enemies, and would hereafter, he hoped, be valuable friends.

The banquet could not fail, under such circumstances, of being a great success. Everyone was in the highest spirits, and when Cyrus, in thanking his guests for their company, said that though Greece and Persia had been enemies in the past they would be firm friends in the future, he was greeted with a burst of tumultuous applause.

The next day the army set out, their last remaining scruples dispelled by an increase of pay.[68] There was still a certain reserve in speaking about the object of the campaign but every one knew that it was directed against the Great King. Two days’ march took them to Issi, a town destined to become famous in later days.[69] The difficult pass of the Cicilian Gate was found unguarded. About a month later the ford of the Euphrates at Thapsacus[70] was reached. Then all disguise was thrown off. Cyrus was marching against his brother, and he would give each man a bonus of a year’s pay when he had reached Babylon.

So the long and tedious march went on. The King made no signs of resistance. Line after line of defense was found unguarded. At last, just ten weeks after the army had marched out of Tarsus, a Persian horseman attached to Cyrus’ person, came galloping up with the news, which he shouted out in Greek and Persian, “The King is coming with a great army ready for battle.”

Something like a panic followed, for the invaders had almost begun to think that they would not have to fight. Cyrus sprang from the carriage in which he had been riding, donned his corslet, and mounted his charger; the Greeks rushed to the wagons in which they had deposited their armor and weapons, and prepared themselves hastily for battle.

By mid-day all was ready. Clearchus was in command of the right wing, which consisted of the heavy-armed Greeks, and rested on the Euphrates the light-armed Greeks, with some Paphlagonian cavalry, stood in the center; on the left were the Persians under Ariæus, Cyrus’ second in command. The extreme left of all was occupied by Cyrus himself with his body guard of six hundred horsemen. All wore cuirasses, cuisses and helmets; but Cyrus, wishing to be easily recognized, rode bareheaded.

It was afternoon before the enemy came in sight. First, a white cloud of dust became visible; then something like a black pall spread far and wide over the plain, with now and then a spear point or bronze helmet gleaming through the darkness. Silently the huge host advanced, its left on the river, its right far overlapping Cyrus’ left, so great was its superiority in numbers. “Strike at the center,” said the Prince to Clearchus, as he rode along the line, “then our work will be done.”

He knew his countrymen; the King himself was in the center. If he should be killed or driven from the field, victory was assured.

The hostile lines were only two furlongs apart, when the Greeks raised the battle shout, and charged at a quick pace, which soon became a run. A few minutes afterwards the Persians broke. Their front line, consisting of scythe-armed chariots, for the most part, turned and drove helter skelter through the ranks of their countrymen; the few that charged the advancing foe did, perhaps attempted to do, no harm. The ranks were opened to let them through, and they took no further part in the battle. Anyhow the Greeks won the victory without losing a single man.

Meanwhile the King, posted, as has been said, in the center, seeing no one to oppose him, advanced as if he would take the Greeks on their flank. Cyrus, seeing this, charged with his six hundred, and broke the line in front of the King. The troopers were scattered in the ardor of pursuit, and the Prince was left alone with a handful of men. Even then all might have been well but for the fit of ungovernable rage which seized him. He spied his brother the King in the throng, and, crying out, “There is the man,” pressed furiously towards him. One blow he dealt him, piercing his corslet, and making a slight wound. Then one of the King’s attendants struck Cyrus with a javelin under the eye. The two brothers closed for a moment in a hand-to-hand struggle. But Cyrus and his followers were hopelessly overmatched. In a few minutes the Prince and eight of his companions were stretched on the ground. One desperate effort was made to save him. Artapates, the closest of his friends, leaped from his horse, and threw his arms around his body. It did but delay the fatal blow for the briefest space. The next moment Cyrus was dead.

CHAPTER XXII.
THE RETREAT.

Seven weeks have passed since the catastrophe recorded in my last chapter.[71] Curiously enough the Greeks had returned to their camp after their easily won victory without any suspicion of what had happened on the other side of the battle field. They wondered, indeed, that Cyrus neither came nor sent to congratulate them on their success, but the news of his death which was brought to them next morning by an Ionian Greek, who had been in the service of Cyrus, came upon them like a thunderclap. Then had followed a period of indecision and perplexity. So long as they had to answer insolent messages from the King or Tissaphernes, bidding them give up their arms and be content with such chance of pardon as they might have, their course was plain. To such demands only one answer was possible. “We will die sooner than give them up,” had been the reply which Cleanor the Arcadian, the senior officer, had made. But when the Persians began to treat, when they agreed upon a truce, and even allowed the Greeks to provision themselves, the course to be followed became less plain. Tissaphernes made indeed the most liberal offers. “We will lead you back to Greece,” he said, “and find you provisions at a fair price. If we do not furnish them, you are at liberty to take them for yourselves, only you must swear that you will behave as if you were marching through the country of friends.” There were some who roundly said that the Greeks had best have no dealings with the man; he was known to be treacherous and false; this was only his way of luring them on to their death. On the other hand it was difficult to refuse terms so advantageous. It was possible that the satrap, though not in the least friendly, was genuinely afraid, and would be glad to get rid at any price of visitants so unwelcome. This was the common opinion. If the army could find its way home without fighting, it would be madness to reject the chance. For many days past, every thing had gone smoothly; relations between the Greeks and Tissaphernes seemed to become more and more friendly. Clearchus, the general, commanding in chief, had even dined with the satrap, had been treated in the most friendly fashion, and was now come back to the camp with a proposition from him for a formal conference at which the Greeks were to be represented by their principal generals. Some voices were raised against this proposal. “No one ever trusted Tissaphernes without repenting it,” was the sentiment of not a few, Xenophon amongst the number. But the opposition was overruled. Five generals and twenty inferior officers proceeded to the tent of Tissaphernes, followed by a troop of stragglers, who availed themselves of the favorable opportunity, as they thought it, of marketing within the enemy’s lines.

“Callias,” said Xenophon to his friend on the morning of this eventful day, “my mind misgives me. The soothsayer tells me that, though the sacrifices have been generally favorable, there have always been some sinister indications. And certain it is that we have never put ourselves so completely in the enemy’s power as we have this day. Tissaphernes has only to say the word and our most skillful leaders are dead men. But, hark, what is that?”

A cry of surprise and wrath went up from the camp, and the two Athenians rushed out of the tent in which they had been sitting, to ascertain the cause. One glance was enough. The stragglers were hurrying back at the top of their speed with the Persians in hot pursuit. Among the foremost of the fugitives was an Arcadian officer, who, fearfully wounded as he was, managed to make his way to the camp. “To arms!” he cried, “Clearchus and the rest are either dead or prisoners.” Instantly there was a wild rush for arms. Everyone expected that the next moment would bring the whole Persian army in sight. But the King and his satraps knew how formidable the Greeks really were. As long as they had a chance of succeeding by fraud, they would not use force.

Fraud was immediately attempted. Ariæus, who by this time had made his peace with the King, rode up to within a short distance of the camp, and said, “Let the Greeks send some one that is in authority to bear a message from the King.” The veteran Cleanor accordingly went forward.

“Let me go with you,” cried Xenophon, “I am eager to hear what has become of my friend Proxenus. Come you, too,” he whispered to Callias.

Ariæus addressed them: “Thus saith the King; Clearchus, having forsworn himself and broken the truth, has been put to death. Proxenus and Medon are honorably treated. As for you, the King demands your arms, seeing that they belonged to Cyrus, who was his slave.”

Cleanor’s answer was brief and emphatic, “Thou villain, Ariæus, and the rest of you, have you no shame before gods or men, that you betray us in this fashion, and make friends with that perjurer Tissaphernes?”

Ariæus could only repeat that Clearchus was a traitor. “Then,” cried Xenophon, “why send us not back Proxenus and Medon, good men you say, who would advise both you and us for the best?”

To this no answer was made; and the party slowly made their way back to the camp. The worst had happened. They were in the midst of their enemies, more than a thousand miles from the sea, and they had lost their leaders.

The two Athenians, who shared the same tent, lay down to rest at an early hour. It still wanted some time to midnight, when Xenophon surprised his companion by suddenly starting up.

“I believe,” he cried, “all will be well after all. I have had a most encouraging dream.”

“What was it?” asked Callias.

“I dreamed,” returned the other, “that I was at home and that there was a great storm of thunder and lightning and that the lightning struck the house and that it blazed up all over.”

Callias stared. “But that does not sound very encouraging.”

“Ah! but listen to what I have to tell you. When Proxenus asked me to come with him on this expedition, I applied to Socrates for his advice. ‘Ask the god at Delphi,’ he said. So I asked the god but not, as he meant me to do, whether I should go or not, but to what gods, if I went, I should sacrifice. Well, this has been a great trouble to me, and I look upon this dream as an answer. First—this is the encouragement—Zeus shows me a light in darkness. The house all on a blaze, I take it, means that we are surrounded with dangers.”

“May it turn out well,” was all that Callias could find it in his heart to say. But if he was tempted to think meanly of his companion, he had soon reason to alter his opinion.

“Whether my dream means what I think or any thing else,” Xenophon went on, “we must act. To fall into the hands of the King means death, and death in the most shameful form. And yet no one stirs hand or foot to avoid it; we lie quiet, as though it were time to take our rest. I shall go and talk to my comrades about it.”

The first thing was to call together his own particular friends, the officers of Proxenus’ division. He found them as wakeful as himself.

“Friends,” he said, “we must get out of the King’s clutches. You know what he did to his own brother. The man was dead; but he must nail his body to a cross. What will he do, think you, to us? No; we must get out of his reach. But how? Not by making terms with him. That only gives him time to hem us in more and more completely. No; we must fight him; and we, who are more enduring and brave than our enemies, have a right to hope that we shall fight to good purpose. And surely the gods will help us rather than them. For are they not faithless and forsworn?

“But, if we are to fight, we must have leaders. Let us choose them then. As for me, I will follow another, or, if you will have it so, I will lead myself. Young I am, but I am at least of an age to take care of myself.”

Then there was a loud cry—“Xenophon for general!” Only one voice was raised in protest, that of a captain, who spoke in very broad Bœotian. “Escape is impossible; we should better try persuasion.” Such was the burden of his speech.

Xenophon turned on him fiercely. “Escape impossible! And yet you know what the King did. First came a haughty command that we should give up our arms. When we refused, he took to soft words and cajolery. He is afraid of us; but if we trust to persuasion we are lost.” Then turning to the others, he cried, “Is this man fit to be a captain? Make him a bearer of burdens. He is a disgrace to the name of Greek.”

“Greek,” cried an Arcadian captain, “he is no Bœotian, nor Greek at all. He is a Mysian slave. I see his ears are bored.” And the man was promptly turned out of camp.

Not a moment was now lost. A representative body of officers from the whole army was promptly collected, and Xenophon was asked to repeat what he had said to the smaller gathering. The meeting ended in the election of five generals to replace those who had been murdered. Chirisophus, a Spartan, made the sixth, having held the office before.

The day was now beginning to dawn. It was scarcely light when the whole army assembled in obedience to a hasty summons which had been sent through the camp.

Chirisophus opened the proceedings. “We have fared ill, fellow soldiers,” he said, “in that we have been robbed of so many officers and have been deserted by our allies. Still we must not give in. If we cannot conquer, at least we can die gloriously. Anyhow we must not fall alive into the hands of the King.”

After an address by another general, Xenophon stood up. He had dressed himself in his best apparel. “Fine clothes will suit victory best,” he said to himself, “and if I die, let me at least die like a gentleman.”

“Gentlemen,” he said, “if we were going to treat with the barbarians, then, knowing how faithless they are, we might well despair; but if we mean, taking our good swords in our hands, to punish them for what they have done, and to secure our own safety, then we may hope for the best.”

At this point, a soldier sneezed. A sneeze was a lucky omen, and by a common impulse all the soldiers bowed their heads. Xenophon seized the opportunity.

“I spoke of safety, gentlemen, and as I was speaking, Zeus the Savior, sent us an omen of good fortune. Let us therefore vow to him a thank-offering for deliverance, if we ever reach our native country. This let us do as an army; and besides, let everyone vow to offer according to his ability in return for his own safe arrival.”

These propositions were unanimously accepted, and the hymn of battle was solemnly sung by the whole army.

“Now,” said the speaker, “we have set ourselves right with the gods, who will doubtless reward our piety, while they will punish these perjurers and traitors who seek to destroy us.”

Then, after appealing to the glorious memories of the past, when the Greeks, fighting against overwhelming odds, had once and again turned back the tide of Persian invasion, he addressed himself to deal with the circumstances of the situation. “Our allies have deserted us; but we shall fight better without such cowards. We have no cavalry; but battles are won by the sword; our foes will have the better only in being able to run away more quickly. No market will be given us; but it is better to take our food than to buy it. If rivers bar our way, we have only to cross them higher up. Verily, I believe that not only can we get away, but that if the King saw us preparing to settle here, he would be glad to send us away in coaches and four, so terribly afraid is he of us.

“But how shall we go? Let us burn our tents and all superfluous baggage. The baggage too often commands the army. That is the first thing to do. Our arms are our chief possession. If we use them aright, everything in the country is ours. Let us march in a hollow square, with the baggage animals and the camp followers in the middle. And let us settle at once who is to command each section of the army.”

All this was accepted without demur. Chirisophus was appointed to command the van, Xenophon, with a colleague, as the youngest of the generals, the rear. Practically these two divided the command between them.

The first experience of an encounter with the enemy was not reassuring; in fact it was almost disastrous. Early in the first day’s march, one Mithridates, a personage well known to the Greeks, for he had been high in Cyrus’ confidence, rode up with a couple of hundred horsemen and twice as many slingers and bowmen. He had a look of coming as a friend; indeed, earlier in that day he had come with what purported to be a conciliatory message from Tissaphernes. But on arriving within a moderate distance of the Greeks he halted, and the next moment there was a shower of bullets and arrows from the slings and bows. The Greeks were helpless. They suffered severely, but could do nothing to the enemy in return. The Cretan archers had a shorter range than that of the Persian bows, and the javelin could not, of course, come anywhere near the slingers. At last Xenophon gave the order to charge. Charge the men did, heavy-armed and light-armed alike. Possibly it was better than standing still to be shot at. But they did not contrive to catch a single man. As foot soldiers they were fairly outpaced; and they had no cavalry. Only three miles were accomplished that day, and the army reached the villages in which they were to bivouac, in a state of great despondency. Unless such attacks could be resisted with better success, the fate of the army was sealed.

Xenophon was severely blamed by his colleagues for his action in charging. He frankly acknowledged his fault. “I could not stand still,” he said, “and see the men falling round me without striking a blow, but the charge was no good. We caught none of them, and we did not find it easy to get back. Thanks to the gods, there were not very many of them; if they had come on in force, we must have been cut to pieces.”

After a short silence, he addressed his colleagues again. “We are at a great disadvantage. Our Cretans cannot shoot as far as their Persian archers; and our hand throwers are useless against the slingers. As for the foot soldiers, no man, however fleet of foot, can overtake another who has a bowshot’s start of him, especially as we cannot push the pursuit far from the main body. The simple truth is that we must have slingers and horsemen of our own. I know that there are Rhodians in the army who can sling leaden bullets to a much greater distance than these Persian slings can reach. I propose, first, that we find out who among them have slings of their own; these we will buy at the proper value; if any know how to plait some more, we will pay them the proper price for doing it; the slings thus obtained, we shall soon get a corps of slingers to use them. Give them some advantage and they will enroll themselves fast enough. Now for the cavalry. We have some horses I know. There are some in the rear-guard with me; there are others that belonged to Clearchus; a good many have been taken from the enemy, and are being used as baggage animals. Let us take the pick of these and equip them for the use of cavalry; we shall soon have some very capable horsemen at our service.”

The idea was promptly carried out. That very night a couple of hundred slingers were enrolled, and the next day, which was spent without any attempt to advance, fifty horsemen passed muster, fairly well-mounted and duly furnished with buff jackets and cuirasses. This was only the first of many instances in which Xenophon showed the fertility and readiness of device which did so much to save the army.

The very next day the new forces were brought into action with the happiest results. Mithridates came up again with his archers and slingers, but encountered a reception on which he had not calculated. The cavalry made a brilliant charge, cutting down a number of the infantry and taking prisoners some seventeen horsemen. At the end of the day’s march, the army reached the Tigris. Fourteen weeks of hard and perilous marching lay before them; but they were fairly well-equipped for the work. I shall take an account of some of the principal incidents of the journey from a diary kept by Callias, who acted throughout as aid-de-camp to Xenophon.

CHAPTER XXIII.
THE DIARY.

October 27.[72]—Our new corps have covered themselves with glory to-day. About noon Tissaphernes himself appeared with a large force of cavalry. He had his own regiments with him; among the others we recognized some of Cyrus’ Persian troops. They want, I suppose, to make the King forget their rebellion. The satrap did not wish to come to close quarters; but he found after all that the quarters were closer than he liked. He was well within range; and as his men were posted in great masses every arrow and every bullet told. It would, in fact, have been impossible to miss, with such a mark to aim at. As for the Persian archers they did no damage at all. But we found their arrows very useful. Our men are now well-equipped, for we discovered an abundant store of bow-strings and lead for the sling bullets in the villages.

November 3.—Things have not been going so well to-day. The barbarians occupied a post of vantage on our route and showered down darts, stones, and arrows upon us as we passed. Our light-armed were easily driven in. When the heavy-armed tried to scale the height, they found the climbing very hard work, and of course the enemy were gone by the time that they reached the top. Three times this was done, and I was never more pleased in my life than when at last we got to the end of our day’s march. Eight surgeons are busy attending to the wounded, of whom there is a terrible number. We are going to stop here three days, Xenophon tells me. Meanwhile we are in a land of plenty. There are granaries full of wheat, and cellars of wine, and barley enough to supply our horses if we had fifty times as many. Hereafter we are to follow a new plan. As soon as we are attacked, we halt. To march and fight at the same time puts us at a disadvantage. And we are to try to get as far in advance as possible.

November 9.—We had our three days’ rest, and then three days’ quick marching. To-day, however, there has been a smart brush with the enemy. They had occupied a ridge commanding our route, which just then descended from the hills into the plain. Chirisophus sent for Xenophon to bring his light-armed to the front. This, of course, was a serious thing to do, as Tissaphernes was not far from our rear. Xenophon accordingly galloped to the front to confer with his colleague. “Certainly,” he said, when he saw how the enemy was posted, “these fellows must be dislodged, but we can’t uncover our rear. You must give me some troops, and I will do my best.” Just at that moment he caught sight of a height rising above us just on our right—he has a true general’s eye—and saw that it gave an approach to the enemy’s position. “That is the place for us to take,” he cried. “If we get that, the barbarians can’t stay where they are.” As soon as the troops were told off for service, we started; and lo! as soon as we were off, the barbarians seeing what we were after started too. It was a race who should get there first. Xenophon rode beside the men, and urged them on. “Now for it, brave sirs!” he cried. “’Tis for Hellas! ’Tis for wives and children! Win the race, and you will march on in peace! Now for it!” The men did their best, but of course it was hard work. I never had harder in my life. At last a grumbling fellow in the ranks growled out, “We are not on equal terms, Xenophon. You are on horseback, and I have got to carry my shield.” In a moment Xenophon was off his horse. He snatched the fellow’s shield from him, and marched on with the rest. That was hard work indeed, for he had his horseman’s cuirass on; still he kept up. Then the men fell on the grumbler. They abused him, pelted him, and cuffed him, till he was glad enough to take his shield again. Then Xenophon re-mounted, and rode on as before as far as the horse could go. Then he left him tethered to a tree, and went on foot. In the end we won the race; and the barbarians left the way clear.

November 10.—We had a great disappointment to-day. The route lay either across a river which was too deep to ford—we tried it with our spears, and could find no bottom—or through a mountainous region inhabited by a set of fierce savages whom the King has never been able to subdue. He once sent an army of a hundred thousand men among them, they say, and not a single soldier ever came back! First we considered about crossing the river. A Rhodian had a grand plan, he said, for taking the army across. He would sell it for a talent. I must confess, by the way, that I am more and more disgusted by the manner in which everything is for sale. Citizen soldiers think of the common good, though, it must be confessed, they are not so sturdy in action as these fellows; mercenaries think only of the private purse. However, the Rhodian never got his talent. His plan was clever enough, making floats of skins, but impracticable, seeing that the enemy occupied the other shore in force. Nothing, then, remained for it but to take to the mountains. We must do our best to fight our way through them, if the mountaineers won’t be friends. This done, we shall find ourselves in Armenia; once there, we shall be able to go anywhere we please.

November 14.—We have had three awful days. The Carduchians—so they call the barbarians—are as hostile and as fierce as they can be. It seems unreasonable, for they must hate the Great King as much as we do. Still they will not listen to our overtures for friendly intercourse, but keep up an incessant attack. To-day there was very near being a positive disaster. We in the rear-guard had, of course, the worst of it. Generally when we find our work particularly hard we pass on the word to the van, and they slacken their pace; otherwise we should get divided from the main army. To-day no attention was paid to our messages; Chirisophus did nothing but send back word that we must hurry on. Consequently our march became something very like a rout, and we lost two of our best men. At the first halt Xenophon rode to the front.

“Why this hurry?” he asked. “It has cost us two men, and we had to leave their bodies behind.” “See you that?” said Chirisophus, and he pointed to a height straight before us, which was strongly held by the enemy. “I wanted to get there first, for the guide says that there is no other way.” “Says he so?” said Xenophon. “Let us hear what my fellows have to say. I laid an ambush, you must know, and caught two barbarians. They would be useful, I thought, as guides!” The two were brought up and questioned. “Is there any other way than what we see?” “No,” said the first. Try all we could, he would make no other answer. At last Chirisophus had him killed. “Now,” he said, turning to the other, “can you tell us anything more?” “O yes,” said the man, “there is another way, and one that horses can pass over. But the other would not say anything about it, because he had kinsfolk living near it, and was afraid that you would do them an injury.” Poor fellow! I was sorry for him, when I knew how loyal he had been. But I don’t know what else could have been done. The second man told us that there was a height which we must occupy if we would make the new route practicable. Two thousand men have set off to get hold of it. If they fail, we shall be in terrible straits.

November 16.—The army is safe for the present, but some—I among the number—have had a very narrow escape. The two thousand found their work very much harder than at first they thought it was going to be. They took the first height without any difficulty, and fancied they had done all that was wanted. But there were no less than three heights beyond, and each of these had to be stormed. My part in the business was this. Xenophon thought that the second of the four heights—there were four in all—ought to be held permanently till our army had passed. Some two hundred men were told off for this duty, and I volunteered to be one of them. All of a sudden we found ourselves attacked by a whole swarm of mountaineers. They outnumbered us by at least ten to one. It was a case for running, for there was really no position that we could hold. But running was no easy matter. Our only chance was to climb down a very steep mountain side to the pass below, where the last columns of the van-guard were just making their way. Some of the men did not like to try it; and, indeed, it did look desperately dangerous. While they were hesitating, the barbarians were upon them. As for myself, I felt that I would sooner break my neck than fall into the enemy’s hands, so I started off at full pace, and was safe. Nor do I think that any who followed my example were seriously hurt, though some got very nasty falls. Those who stayed behind were killed to a man. Just now we are in comfortable quarters. Wine is in such plenty hereabouts that positively the people keep it in great cisterns.

November 19.—We have crossed the Centrites, which is the Eastern branch of the Tigris.

November 30.—The march through Armenia has been on the whole as pleasant as we had hoped. The Lieutenant Governor, one Tiribazus, made an agreement with our generals that he would do us no harm, if we would not burn the houses, but content ourselves with taking such provisions as we wanted. Four days ago, we had a heavy fall of snow, and the general thought it as well to billet out the army in the villages, which are very thick in these parts. There was no enemy in sight, and, as we had no tents, bivouacking in the open would be neither pleasant nor safe. We all enjoyed it vastly, particularly as the villages were full of good things, oxen, and sheep, and wine, some of the very best I ever tasted, and raisins, and vegetables of all kinds. But after the first night we had an alarm. A great army was reported in sight; and certainly there were watchfires in every direction. The generals thereupon determined to bring the army together again, and to bivouac on the plain. The weather too, promised to be fine. But in the night there was another heavy snow fall, so heavy that it covered us all up. It was not uncomfortable lying there under the snow; in fact, it felt quite warm; but of course it was not safe. I have heard of people going to sleep under such circumstances and not waking up again. Anyhow Xenophon set the example of getting up, and setting to work splitting wood. Before long we were all busy. But there was no more bivouacking in the open. We went to the villages again; and some foolish fellows who had wantonly set their houses on fire were now punished for their folly.

December 8.—The weather becomes colder and colder, and is our worst enemy now. The other day there was a cutting north wind, which drifted the snow till it was more than six feet deep in places. Xenophon, whose faith and piety are admirable, suggested a sacrifice to the north wind. This was made; and certainly the weather did begin to abate shortly afterwards. The doubters say that the wind always does go down after a time. These are matters on which I do not pretend to judge; but I do see that Xenophon’s pious belief makes him very cheerful and courageous. The day before yesterday many of our men were afflicted, what with the long march and what with the cold, with a sort of ravenous hunger. They fell down, and either would not, or could not, move a step forward. At first we did not know what was the matter with them; but then some one who had campaigned before in cold countries suggested the real cause. When we gave them a little food we found that they recovered. Yesterday we nearly lost a number of men who were simply overpowered with the cold. The enemy was close behind, and we tried to raise the poor fellows up; but they would not stir. “Kill us,” they said, “but leave us alone.” They were simply stupid with cold. All that could be done was to frighten the enemy away. On the barbarians came, till the rear guard, who were lying in ambush, dashed out upon them, and at the same time the sick men shouted as loud as they could, and rattled their spears against their shields. The enemy fled in a hurry, and we saw and heard no more of them. But what would have happened if they had persisted, is more than I can say. The whole army was demoralized with the cold. The men lay down as they could with their cloaks round them. There was not a single guard placed anywhere. As it was, no harm was done; and in the afternoon to-day the sick men were brought safe into good quarters. We are now in excellent quarters, with all that we could wish to eat and drink.

December 9.—Just as I had finished my entries yesterday an Athenian with whom I have struck up a great friendship asked me to come with him on an expedition. His name is Polycrates, and he is the captain of a company. “Let us raid that village,” he said, “before the people have time to get away.” So we did, and we had a fine catch. We laid hands on the villagers and their head man. With the head man was his daughter who had been married only eight days before. Her husband was out hare-hunting, and so escaped. The village was a curious place. All the houses were underground; beasts and men lived there together, the beasts entering by a sloping way, the men by a ladder. There were great stores of barley, and wheat, and green stuff of all kinds. The drink was barley wine, which they keep in great bowls. You have to suck it up by a reed. It is very strong. As to the flavor I feel a little doubtful. To-day Xenophon has been taking the head man, whom he had to sup with him last night, all round the camp, by which I mean the villages, for the men are encamped in them. At Chirisophus’ quarters there was a strange sight. The men were feasting with wisps of hay round their heads, for lack of flowers; and Armenian boys, in the costume of their country, were waiting on them. Everything of course had to be explained by signs, for neither soldiers nor waiters knew a word of each other’s language. Xenophon gave the head man his old charger, which indeed was pretty well worn out with marching, and took for himself and his officers a number of young horses which were going to be sent, we were told, as part of the King’s tribute.

December 27.—Nothing of much moment has happened, except it be a quarrel, the first that has taken place—and I devoutly hope the last—between our generals. After resting in the villages for a week, we started again, taking the head man with us as a guide. If he did this duty properly, he was to be allowed to depart and to take his son with him, for he had a young son in his company. All the rest of his family were safe in his own village with a very handsome lot of presents. At the end of the third day Chirisophus got into a great rage because the head man had not taken them to any village. The man declared that there was no village near. But Chirisophus would not listen, and struck the man. The next night he ran away. Xenophon was very angry. “You ought not to have struck him,” he said; “but having struck him, you certainly ought to have kept a doubly strict guard on him.”

December 30.—We have crossed the river Phasis, and got through what is, I hope, our last difficult pass. I have not time to write about it; but I must record an amusing little controversy that took place between our two generals. It shows anyhow that they have made up their quarrel. Xenophon had been insisting that they must do as much as they could by craft, and had been speaking of stealing somewhere at night, stealing a march, and so forth. Then he went on, “But why do I talk about stealing in your presence Chirisophus, for you Spartans are experts in the art. You practice it, I am told, from your youth up. It is honorable among you to take anything except what the law forbids. But to encourage you and to make you master thieves you get a whipping if you are found out. I must not therefore presume to instruct you about stealing.” “Nay,” replied the other, “you have the best possible right to do it. You Athenians, I am told, are wonderfully clever hands at stealing the public money and the best men among you do it the most. No; we Spartans must yield to you.” In the end the pass was carried without much loss.

January 3.—For several days we have been on very short commons. The Taochi, through whose country we are passing, have collected all their possessions, alive and dead, into strong places. At last we felt that something had to be done, for we were simply starving. Accordingly, when we came about noon to-day to one of these strongholds which happened to lie directly on our route, Chirisophus made up his mind to take it. It could be seen to be full of flocks and herds besides a mixed crowd of men, women and children. First one regiment went up against it; then a second; then a third. They could do nothing with it; the slingers and archers, which were the only troops we could use, made no impression at all. Just then Xenophon came up with the rear-guard, I being close behind him. “You have come just in the nick of time my friend,” said Chirisophus, “we must take this place or starve.” “But what,” Xenophon asked, “is to hinder our simply walking in?” Chirisophus answered, “You see that one narrow path, that is the only way of approaching the place. Whenever anyone attempts to go by it, these fellows roll down huge masses of rock from the crag up there,” and he pointed to a cliff that overhung the plain. “See what has happened to some of my poor fellows who were unlucky enough to get in the way!” And sure enough there was one man with one leg broken and another with both, and a third with his ribs crushed in. “But,” said my own general, “when these fellows have expended their ammunition—and they can’t have a perpetual supply of it—there will be nothing else to hinder our going in. I can only see a very few men, and of these not more than two or three are armed. As for the distance that we have to get across, it cannot be more than one hundred and fifty yards; and two-thirds of this are covered at intervals by great pine trees. As long as we are among these, stones cannot hurt us. These past, there are only fifty yards more to be crossed.” “Very good,” said Chirisophus, “but the moment we get near, the fire of stones begins again.” “All the better,” said Xenophon, “the hotter their fire, the quicker the enemy will use up their ammunition. However, let us begin by picking out the place where the run across the open space will be shortest.”

First we occupied the trees. I had the luck, by special favor of Xenophon, to be among them. We were only seventy, for no more could find proper shelter behind the pines. Then one of us came forward a yard or two from under cover of the pines. No sooner did the Taochi see him than they sent down a vast quantity of stones. Before they reached him he was under cover again. This he did several times; and every time a wagon-load of rocks, at the very least, must have been whizzing and whistling down the slope. Before long, however, the ammunition gave signs of not holding out. As soon as Agasias, an Arcadian from Lake Stymphalus, perceived this, he ran forward at full speed. The man who had been amusing himself with the rocks, caught hold of his shield as he ran by. Then two other men started. Altogether it was a splendid race, and curiously enough not another stone was thrown. Then the rest of us followed. But when I saw the horrible thing that ensued, I was inclined to be sorry that I had anything to do with it. The women threw their children over the cliff, and then threw themselves after them, and the men did the same. I caught hold of one man to stop him, but he wriggled out of my grasp, and threw himself over the top. It was well for me that he did so or else I might have fared as Æneas of Stymphalus did. He saw a man very finely dressed just about to throw himself over, and tried to hold him. The man did not try to get away, but clasped Æneas tightly in his arms. The next moment both had fallen headlong over the edge. Of course they were both killed. We took very few prisoners, but flocks and herds as many as we wanted and more.

January 26.—The marching has been easy enough on the whole, though we have met with the bravest enemies that we have yet come across, the Chalybes, they are called. They did not hang on our rear, taking care never to fight unless they had some vantage ground, but met us fairly face to face. They were not as well armed as we. Indeed, they had no armor on the body except cuirasses of linen. Their chief weapon was a very long and clumsy spear. Nevertheless they made a good fight of it; and if they did kill a man they cut his head off directly with a short sabre that they carried at their waists. We got nothing but hard knocks here. All the property of the country was stored away in strongholds; still what we got from the Taochi has lasted us up to this time, and will supply us for some days to come. The country of the Chalybes past, we came to the city, the first, by the way, that we have seen. It seemed very populous and rich, and its governor was extremely civil. He gave us a guide who told us the best news that we had heard for a long time. “Within five days you shall see the sea,” he said. “If I fail, my life shall be the forfeit.” According to this we ought to see it to-morrow.

January 27.—We have seen it! I was in the van-guard as usual. We had our hands full, for the people of the country were up in arms against us. Our friend, the guide, had been very urgent with us to ravage and burn the country; and the men had not been backward in following his advice. So now there was a whole swarm of enemies hanging on our heels, and we of the rear guard had to keep them in check. All of a sudden we heard a tremendous uproar. “There is another attack on the van,” cried Xenophon, “this looks serious.” But the shouting grew louder and nearer. As soon as a company came up, it began racing towards the shouters, and then took to shouting itself. Xenophon mounted his horse to see for himself what had happened. He took the cavalry with him in case anything should have happened, and I made the best of my way after them. Presently we could distinguish the words. The men were shouting, The sea! The sea! Then everybody started running, rear guard and all; even the very baggage horses were taken with it and came galloping up. And, sure enough, there it was, right before our eyes, a glimpse of blue in the distance with the sunshine upon it. What a scene it was! We all fell to embracing one another; rank was forgotten; generals, officers, and common men were friends. Indeed the gods could not have given to our eyes a more delightful sight. Presently the soldiers fell to erecting a great cairn of stones. On this they put skins and staves and wicker shields that we had taken from the enemy. Of course the guide had a very handsome present from the common store, a purse, a silver bowl, a Persian dress, and ten gold pieces. Then he begged some rings, and got not a few. The soldiers were ready to give him anything.

February 2.—We have passed safely through another country. The people were drawn out in order of battle when the luckiest thing happened, saving, I doubt not, many lives. One of the men came up to Xenophon and said: “I think I know the language these people talk. I verily believe that it is my own.” And so it turned out to be. The man had been a slave in Athens. He explained to them that we did not wish to do them any harm, but simply wanted to get back to our own country. Since then it has been peaceful. The people—Macrones they call themselves—have been as helpful as possible, making roads for us, and supplying us with as good food as they possessed.

February 7.—Yesterday I really thought that after all that I had gone through, I was going to die of eating a mouthful of honey. We found a great store of this in one of the Colchian villages that we came to, and of course ate it freely. It was poisonous, at least to persons not used to it. I know that I was desperately ill and so were many of my comrades. Happily no one died. We reach Trapezus to-morrow. We are in Greece again. Thanks be to Zeus and all the gods!

CHAPTER XXIV.
A THANKSGIVING.

The worst severity of the winter was over when the army reached Trapezus. The days were longer, for it was already half way between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, and though the nights were still bitterly cold, the sun was daily gaining power. Sometimes a breeze from the west gave to the air quite a feeling of spring. Still Callias was very thankful to find quarters in the city. He discovered but scarcely with surprise, that as soon as he returned within the circle of Greek influence, the credentials furnished him by Hippocles made life much smoother for him. Trapezus was the very farthest outpost of civilization; it was at least nine hundred miles from Athens, yet the name of Hippocles seemed as well known and his credit as good as if it had been the Piraeus itself. As soon as permission could be obtained to enter the town—for the people of Trapezus, though kind and even generous to the new arrivals, kept their gates jealously shut—Callias made his way to the house of a citizen who was, he was told, the principal merchant in the place. Nothing could have been warmer than the welcome which he received, when he produced the slip of parchment to which Hippocles had affixed his seal and signature.

“All I have is at your disposal,” cried Demochares; this was the name of the Trapezuntine merchant. “I cannot do too much for any friend of Hippocles. You will, of course, take up your quarters with me; and any advance that you may want,—unless,” he added with a smile, “you have learnt extravagance among the Persians, for we are not very rich here in Trapezus—any advance within reason you have only to ask for.”

The young Athenian ventured to borrow fifty gold pieces, astonishing his new friend by the moderation of his demand. He knew that some of his comrades, mercenaries who had not received an obolus of pay for several months, must be very badly off, and he was glad to make a slight return for many little services that he had received, and acts of kindness and good fellowship that had been done for him on the march. As for hospitality, he begged to be allowed to postpone his answer till he could consult his general.

“I don’t like to leave you, sir,” he said when he broached the subject to Xenophon after their evening meal. “Why should I have the comforts of a house, lie soft, and feed well, while you are sleeping on the ground, and getting or not getting a meal, as good luck or bad luck will have it?”

“My dear fellow,” replied Xenophon, “there is no reason why you should not take the good the gods provide you. You are not one of us; you never have been. You came as a volunteer, and a volunteer you have remained. You are perfectly free to do as you please. Besides, if you want anything more to satisfy you, you are attached to my command, and I formally give you leave.”

Callias, accordingly, took up his quarters in the merchant’s house. Never was guest more handsomely treated. Demochares and his family were never wearied of his adventures, a story which has indeed interested the world ever since, and which to these Greeks of Trapezus had a meaning which it had lost for us. Living as they did on the farthest boundaries of the Greater Greece, the Greece of the colonies, they were keenly alive to all that could be known about the barbarian world with which they were brought in constant contact. The young Athenian, indeed, held a sort of levee which was thronged day after day with visitors young and old. All that he had to tell them about the Great King, on whose dominions they were in some sort trespassers, and about the unknown tribes who dwelt between the sea and the Persian capital, was eagerly listened to. Pleasant as his sojourn was to himself, it was not without some advantage to his old comrades. His host was an important person in Trapezus, holding indeed the chief magistracy for the year, and he had much to do with the liberal present of oxen, corn, and wine which the town voted to the army.

A month passed in a sufficiently pleasant way. Meanwhile the army was preparing to offer a solemn thanksgiving for the safe completion of the most perilous part of its journey. The vows made at the moment of its greatest danger were now to be paid, and paid, after the usual Greek fashion, in a way that would combine religion and festivity. There was to be a sacrifice; the sacrifice was to be followed by a feast, and the feast again by a celebration which was, of course, in a great measure an entertainment, but was also, in a way, a function of worship. Wrestlers, boxers, and runners not only amused the spectators and contended for glory and prizes, but were also supposed in some way to be doing honor to the gods.

The sacrifice and the feast it is not necessary to describe. Necessarily there was nothing very splendid or costly about them. The purses of the soldiers were empty, though they had a good deal of property, chiefly in the way of prisoners whom they had captured on the way, and whom they would sell in the slave markets as the opportunity might come. Trapezus, however, and the friendly Colchian tribes in the neighborhood furnished a fair supply of sheep and oxen to serve as victims, and a sufficient quantity of bread, wine, dried fruit and olive oil, this last being a luxury which the Greeks had greatly missed during their march, and which they highly appreciated. A few of the officers, the pious Xenophon among them, went to the expense of gilding the horns of the beasts which were their special offerings; but for the most part the arrangements were of a plain and frugal kind.

The games had at least the merit of affording a vast amount of entertainment to a huge multitude of spectators. They were celebrated, it may be easily understood, under considerable difficulties, for Trapezus did not possess any regular race course, and the only rings for wrestling and boxing were within the walls, and therefore not available on this occasion. By common consent the management of the affair was handed over to a certain Dracontius. He was a Spartan, and to the Spartans, who had been undisputed lords of Greece since the fall of Athens, had been conceded a certain right of precedence on all such occasions as these. Dracontius, too, was a man of superior rank to his comrades. He belonged to one of the two royal houses of Sparta, but had been banished from his country in consequence of an unlucky accident. In one of the rough sports which the Spartan lads were accustomed to practice, sports which were commonly a more or less close mimicry of war, a blow of his dagger, dealt without evil intention but with a criminal carelessness, had been fatal to a companion. Hence, from boyhood, he had been an exile; cut off from the more honorable career to which he might have looked forward in the service of his country, he had been content to enlist as a mercenary.

Dracontius, accordingly, was made president of the games. The skins of the sacrificed animals were presented to him, as his fee, and he was asked to lead the way to the racecourse where the contests were to be held.

“Race course!” cried the Spartan, with the brusquerie which it was the fashion of his country to use, “Race course! What more do you want than what we have here?”

A murmur of astonishment ran through the army. Indeed there could have been nothing less like a race course than the ground on which they were standing. It was the slope of a hill, a slope that sometimes became almost precipitous. Most of it was covered with brushwood and heather. Grass there was none, except here and there where it covered with a treacherously smooth surface some dangerous quagmire. Here and there, the limestone rock cropped up with jagged points.

“But where shall we wrestle?” asked Timagenes, an Arcadian athlete, who had won the prize for wrestling two or three years before at the Lithurian games, and who naturally considered himself as an authority on the subject.

“Here of course,” was the president’s reply.

“But how can a man wrestle on ground so hard and so rough?” asked the Arcadian, who had no idea of practising his art except in a regular ring.

“Well enough,” said Dracontius, “but those who are thrown will get worse knocks.”

The wrestler’s face fell and he walked off amid a general laugh. His comrades fancied, not without reason, that he was a great deal too careful of his person.

But if the ground, broken with rocks and overgrown with wood was not suited to scientific wrestling, it certainly helped to make some of the other sports more than usually amusing. The first contest was a mile race for boys. Most of the competitors were lads who had been taken prisoners on the march, but a few Colchians entered for the prize, as did also two or three boys of Trapezus, who had the reputation of being particularly fleet of foot. But the natives of the plain, still more the inhabitants of the town, found themselves entirely outpaced on this novel race course by the young mountaineers. A Carduchian came in first, and was presented with his liberty, his master being compensated out of the prize fund which had been subscribed by the army. As soon as he understood that he was free, he set out at full speed in the direction of his home. A true mountaineer, he sickened for his native hills, and in the hope of seeing them again was ready to brave alone the perils which an army had scarcely survived.

A foot race for men followed, but the distance to be traversed was, according to the common custom of the great games, only two hundred yards. There were as many as sixty competitors; but curiously enough, they were to a man Cretans. Another foot race, this time for men in heavy armor, was next run. The president had a Spartan’s admiration for all exercises that had a real bearing on military training, and the race of the heavy armed was unquestionably one of these. It was won by a gigantic Arcadian, an Ætolian whose diminutive stature made a curious contrast to his competitor, coming in close behind him.

Next came the great event of the day, the “Contest of the Five Exercises,” or “Pentathlon.” The five were leaping, wrestling, running, quoit-throwing, and javelin-throwing. The competitor who won most successes had the prize adjudged to him.[73] Callias had been trained for some time at home with the intention of becoming a competitor at Olympia; but various causes had hindered him from carrying out his purpose, and, of course, he was now wholly out of practice. He was sitting quietly among the spectators when he felt a hand upon his shoulder and looking up, saw his general standing by.

“Stand up for the honor of Athens,” said Xenophon, “don’t let the men of the Island[74] carry everything before them.”

“But I am not in training,” said Callias.

“You are in as good training, I fancy,” replied the general, “as are any of these; better I should say, to judge from the way in which they have been eating and drinking since the retreat was ended. Besides, it is only the boxers who absolutely require anything very severe in that way. And you have youth.”

Callias still made objections, but yielded when his general made the matter a personal favor.

The competitors were five in number, the winner of the foot-race, the tall Arcadian and his diminutive rival from Ætolia, two Achaeans, and Callias.

The first contest was leaping at the bar. Here the Arcadian’s long legs served him well. He was a singularly ungainly fellow, and threw himself over the bar, if I may be allowed the expression, in a lump. Every time the bar was raised, he managed just to clear it, though the spectators could not understand how his clumsy legs, which seemed sprawling everywhere, managed to avoid touching it. Still they did manage it, and when he had cleared four cubits short of a palm, which may be translated into the English measure of five feet nine inches, his rivals had to own themselves beaten. Callias, who came second, declared that he had been balked by the infamous playing of the flute player, whose music according to the custom followed at Olympia, accompanied the jumping. “The wretch,” he declared to the friends who condoled with him on the loss of what they had put down to him for a certainty, “the wretch played a false note just as I was at my last trial. If I had not heard him do the same at least half-a-dozen times before, I should have said that he did it on purpose.”

If chance or fraud had been against him in this trial, in the next he was decidedly favored by fortune. This was the foot race. The course was, as usual, round a post fixed about a hundred yards from the starting point, and home again. Whenever a turn has to be made, a certain advantage falls to the competitor who has the inner place, and when, as in this case, the distance is short, the advantage is considerable. The places were determined by lot. The innermost fell to the Arcadian; Callias came next to him; fortunately for him, his most dangerous competitor, the Cretan who had won the foot race, had the outermost, i. e., the worst station. The Arcadian jumped away with a lead, and for fifty yards managed, thanks to the long strides which his long legs enabled him to take, to keep in front; but the effort was soon spent; by the time that the turning point was reached, Callias had gained enough upon him to attempt the dangerous manœuvre of taking his ground. If it had not been for this, he must have been beaten, for the fleet-footed Cretan, weighted though he was by his disadvantageous place, ran a dead heat with him.

In the quoit-throwing, the Arcadian’s strength and stature brought him to the front again. With us quoit-playing is a trial of skill as well as of strength. The quoit is thrown at a mark, and the player who contrives to go nearest to this mark, without touching it (for to touch it commonly ends in disaster) wins. At the same time the throw does not count unless the quoit either sticks into the ground or lies flat upon it with the right side uppermost. In the Greek game there were no requirements of this kind. The quoit was a huge mass of metal with notches by which it could be conveniently grasped, or, sometimes, a hole in the middle through which a leather strap or wooden handle could be put. He who threw it farthest was the winner. Some little knack was required, as is indeed the case in every feat of strength, and, as has been said before, stature was the chief qualification. The Arcadian hurled the quoit, a mass of iron weighing ten pounds, to the vast distance of forty-two feet. None of his rivals came near him. As he had now won two events out of three, and his gigantic height and weight would make him, to say the least, a formidable opponent in the wrestling, he was a favorite for the prize. His Arcadian countrymen, who formed, as has been said, a large proportion of the army, were in high hope, and staked sums that were far beyond their means on his success.

The quoit-throwing was followed by hurling the javelin at a mark. Here the Arcadian was hopelessly distanced, for here skill was as much wanted as strength had been in the preceding trial. He threw the javelin indeed with prodigious force, but threw it wholly wide of the mark. Indeed, when he was performing, the near neighborhood of the mark would have been the safest place to stand. The spectators were more than once in danger of their lives, so at random and at the same time so vigorous were his strokes. The first mark was a post rudely fashioned into the figure of a man. To hit the head was the best aim that could be made; to hit a space marked out upon the body and roughly representing the heart was the next; the third in merit was a blow that fell on some other part of the body. The legs counted for nothing. Callias and the Cretan scored precisely the same. The Athenian hit the head twice, scoring six for the two blows. The third time his javelin missed altogether. The Cretan, on the other hand, in his three strokes hit the third, second, and the first places successively, scoring for them one, two, and three respectively. Further trials of skill were now given. A wand about three fingers wide was set up at a distance of twelve yards. The Cretan’s javelin pierced it, making it, as may be supposed, an exceedingly difficult thing for a rival to equal, much more to surpass the performance. But Callias was equal to the occasion. Amid tumultuous applause from the spectators, for his courtesy and carriage had made him a great favorite, he hurled his javelin with such accuracy that he split that which was already sticking in the mark. Again the Cretan and he were pronounced to have made a tie.

The two Achaeans and the Ætolian did creditably, scoring five each. As they had failed in four out of the five contests, the prize was clearly out of their reach, and they stood out of the last competition, the wrestling.

And now came the last and deciding struggle. Here again fortune decidedly favored the Athenian. The president, following the rule always observed at Olympia, ordered three lots marked A, B, and C, and representing respectively Callias, the Arcadian, and the Cretan, to be put into an urn. The two first drawn were to contend in the first heat, the third was to have what is technically called a “bye.” The “bye” fell to the lot of Callias, and with it, it need hardly be said, the not inconsiderable advantage of coming fresh to contend with a rival who had undergone the fatigue of a previous struggle.

The issue of the contest between the Arcadian and the Cretan was not long in doubt. The latter was an agile fellow, who would have had a very good chance with “light-weights,” to use again a technical term, if the competitors had been so classed, as indeed they are by the customs of the modern wrestling ring. But against his gigantic opponent he had scarcely a chance. In the first bout the Arcadian lifted his antagonist clean from the ground, and threw him down at full length without more ado. The second was more equal. The Cretan struck his antagonist’s left ankle so sharply with his foot that the giant fell, but he could not loose the other’s hold, and fell also, scoring only the advantage of being the uppermost. If there had been a tie in the other two bouts this might have sufficed to give him the victory, or the president might have ordered a fresh trial. But the third bout was decisive. It was in fact a repetition of the first, only, if possible, still more decisive. The Cretan was again lifted from the ground, before he had the chance of practising any of his devices, and again hurled at full length upon the ground. This time he was stunned, and carried insensible from the ground by his companions.

A brief interval was now allowed. It was thought unfair that the Arcadian should be called upon to engage a fresh antagonist without some chance of resting himself. But what was meant for an advantage turned out to be exactly the contrary. The man was not particularly tired, but he was exceedingly thirsty, and he had not learnt the habit of self-control. Regardless of the remonstrance of his companions, he indulged himself with a huge goblet of wine and water. So imprudent was he indeed that he put less water than was usual in the mixture, and slightly confused his brain by the potency of the draught. When he came forth to meet his antagonist, he had not only damaged his wind but had made his footing somewhat unsteady. Three bouts, as before, were fought. The Arcadian first tried the simple tactics which had been successful with the Cretan. He did his best to lift the Athenian from the ground, and Callias had all he could do to prevent it. But his weight and his strength, which he made the most of by his coolness, stood him in good stead. After a fierce struggle both fell together, and fell in such a way that the president declared that neither had gained any advantage. Practically, however, the victory was decided in favor of Callias. The Arcadian’s strength was impaired, and he was so scant of breath that he could not use what was left to him. And he had little skill to fall back upon, whereas his antagonist had been the favorite pupil of one of the best trainers in Athens. In the second bout Callias struck the Arcadian on the right foot with his own left; in the third he simply reversed the device, striking the left with his right. In both he contrived to free himself when his opponent fell. Thus the fifth contest ended for him in an unquestioned victory.

The prize of victory was an ox and a purse of twenty-five gold pieces, for soldiers who fought for pay would not have relished the barren honor of a wreath of wild olive with which the Olympian judges were accustomed to reward the victors. Callias won golden opinions from his comrades by the liberality with which he disposed of his gains. The ox he presented to the company to which he had been attached; the money he divided, in such proportion as seemed right, among the unsuccessful competitors.

One more contest remained, and it turned out to be the most entertaining of them all. This was a horse race. The competitors were to make their way from the hill-top to the shore and back again. The headlong, break-neck speed at which they galloped down, and the slow and painful effort by which they crawled back again, were witnessed with inextinguishable laughter by the assembled crowds. Xenophon himself took a part in this sport, and gained great favor not only by his condescension but by his skillful riding. He did not win indeed, for the animal which he rode was hopelessly inferior, but his performance did not discredit the land which claimed by the bounty of the god of the sea to have been the birthplace of the horse.[75] The piety of Xenophon always ready to show itself, did not fail to improve the occasion of his young friend’s success.